@mazik765 said:

@GuyIncognito said:

@Barbed_Haywire said:

Hi all,

Jim Sterling from GameFront just wrote a pretty poignant article about the backlash he got for giving Gears of War 3 a score of 8/10, I find stuff like this absolutely fascinating so I thought I'd share it with everyone and get your thoughts.

http://www.gamefront.com/gears-of-war-3-perfect-review-scores-by-divine-right/

So what do you think? Personally I hate that the 1-10 scale has become a 7-10 scale, and that developers and fanboys think, just by the mere fact of a game being a AAA title, it must be entitled to a certain score.

"Last night, I reviewed Gears of War 3 for Destructoid"

I stopped reading right there.

You got farther than I did. I stopped at the first mention this was associated in anyway with Jim Sterling.

Key word is JIM STERLING

@Barbed_Haywire said:

Hi all,

Jim Sterling from GameFront just wrote a pretty poignant article about the backlash he got for giving Gears of War 3 a score of 8/10, I find stuff like this absolutely fascinating so I thought I'd share it with everyone and get your thoughts.

http://www.gamefront.com/gears-of-war-3-perfect-review-scores-by-divine-right/

So what do you think? Personally I hate that the 1-10 scale has become a 7-10 scale, and that developers and fanboys think, just by the mere fact of a game being a AAA title, it must be entitled to a certain score.

AHAHAHA You took somthing that Jim Sterling wrote serious. Im pretty sure hes PAID to be a troll.

I think Cliffy B is just mad his bonus isn't going to be bigger.

I agree with him completely.

@damnable_fiend said:

I agree with him completely.

Ditto, never understood all the hate this guy gets. He raises important points but it's like no-one wants to listen o_O

@Ryman said:

@damnable_fiend said:

I agree with him completely.

Ditto, never understood all the hate this guy gets. He raises important points but it's like no-one wants to listen o_O

Hey look another Jim Sterling review with another Jim Sterling review explanation follow-up article. I assume he writes these up in advance when he writes his reviews by now.
 
Sure he makes some good points, but they're all points that have been made by everybody, numerous times before - just briefer, more polite and less self-serving than his version of it. I'm not disagreeing with his score (any of his scores) or the points he makes, I just don't dig his shtick of feigning shock and disappointment at every opportunity. Post something controversial, wait for replies, post shocked and disgusted follow-up. 
 
He's a smart enough guy and can, at times, be entertaining, but as a reviewer I just don't believe providing useful information is anywhere to be found on his list pf priorities.

I never understood why a 5 star scale is any better than a 10 point scale. Anyone have a good argument for it?

@Nottle: There is none. The problem is that review sites like metacritic need a score to be placed on a game to be put on the site. So, sites put numbers reviews in order to make it to that review aggregator and draw traffic to their site.

The really good reviews won't put a number at the end of the review, but rather sum their feelings for it up in the entire article. Then, after reading it, you can decide if it's something you see yourself enjoying or not.

A review (score) is just a person's opinion.  You can feel free to disagree with a person's opinion, but it doesn't make their review wrong.

This might be one of the most insightful first posts I've ever seen.

Pretty good article. I'm not surprised dumb gamers are acting dumb but its kinda disappointing that devs are getting in there too. Be proud of your gamer but pulling a 'WTF??' over an 8/10 is dumb.

Glad I don't write reviews for big sites as my score thus far for the game is certainly below an 8

I don't normally like Jim Sterling. His reviews and scores are often trolling and trying to get attention. But that is a great article. He raises a lot of great points and speaks a lot of sense.

I'd rather spend my time playing the games I enjoy, than spending my time complaining about review scores.

Scores have become inflated recently. I'll admit that I think that Gears 3 should deserve a high score because it is a step above Gears 1 and 2 but to get butthurt over an 8? That's childish. Go to any AAA game video review that gets an 8-8.5 on Gamespot and take a look at all the butthurt. Sometimes I really, really hate gamers.

@Nottle said:

I never understood why a 5 star scale is any better than a 10 point scale. Anyone have a good argument for it?

Easy. 1 star is used for games that tend to be shit. 2 stars is for games with a lot of flaws. 3 stars is the middle of the road and it's not completely awesome or completely terrible. 4 stars is a solid but not perfect game. 5 stars is "yo this is game is badass". It's an easy system and it's better than the silly 10 point scale. Like there's a big difference between an 8.7 and a 8.8 game.

I think Jim Sterling is a pretty fascinating guy. We do not have similar tastes but, like Giantbomb, I am glad there is someone like him to make the whole video game "journalism" thing a lot less boring. I think he is genuine too, not just trying to stir up controversy for the sake of it.

 It's an easy system and it's better than the silly 10 point scale. Like there's a big difference between an 8.7 and a 8.8 game.

@ProfessorEss said:

@Afroman269 said:

It's an easy system and it's better than the silly 10 point scale. Like there's a big difference between an 8.7 and a 8.8 game.

There are no 8.7s or 8.8s in a ten point scale Afro. Unless it's a 10 point scale that rates games from 8 to 9? Which would be awesome btw.

Ya I meant the 1-10 scale, should have specified. An 8-9 would be awesome.

@Jeffsekai said:

This happens every time, who gives a shit.

Honestly.

The internet can be exhausting at times.

Its simple, you go back to school. What are the grades for percentages? You can't change everyone's mind and as a reviewer, you need to keep that in mind. Are you writing the review for yourself and how you see scoring or how people you want reading your review see scoring. Try as you might, you aren't gonna change perceptions because it is how we grew up, how we went to school.

100-90% is an A

89-80% is a B

79-70% is a C

69-60% is a D

<59% an F

This is a great game and deserves an A. So if he sees average as 50, ok but thats not what everyone sees and a lot of people in the journalism business seem to think they are writing the review for themselves. yes it is their opinion but how you express that opinion should be catered to the audience. Another thing to remember is that this is a score, and an average game should not score half the possible points, thats pretty bad.

These reviewers make a name for themselves by "breaking away from the pack" and giving AAA games a lower score than their peers. Instant notoriety! Then, to defend themselves, they try to single-handedly re-weight the gaming scores that we're all used to. "Homefront? It was an average game. It should have gotten a 5. Gears should get a 7-8."

The irony is, either way the scale slides, the relative distance between a Gears and a Homefront game stay the same. So what does it matter if games are a 7-10 scale, or a 5-8 scale? Sterling is getting his 15 minutes off of Gears 3 by making himself into a martyr, basically.

I am completely baffled as to why anyone would complain about an 8/10. An 8/10 means that a game is fucking great. Not every game deserves a 9/10

I also still don't understand why people think Jim is a troll.His reviews are almost always around the metacritic average. He's given almost every game that came out this month at least a 7(which is good in destuctoid's score system). The only that I think got below that was the new bloodrayne game.

This is entirely the fault of aggregators like Metacritic. If people's bonuses/jobs/whatever weren't tied to a game getting a certain Metacritic score, the devs wouldn't care and all we'd be left with are the incoherent idiots who would be around anyway. This is why reviews shouldn't even come with scores. Maybe a recommend/don't recommend but no sort of numeric score. It's never not controversial.

I think Jim Sterling "let's call attention by being a troll act" is getting dry.

I was shocked whenever Afro Samurai came out and heard that it getting 7.5s were considered 'negative' reviews. Since then it's all been down hill, what's the point of a number system when the numbers don't actually mean anything?

@hinderk said:

I am completely baffled as to why anyone would complain about an 8/10. An 8/10 means that a game is fucking great.

I do not associate an 8/10 score with something being "great".

I still can't make love to Anya under suppressive fire. I think that factored into the score.

@Meowshi: That's what it means to me.

Of course if I have any questions, I usually read the review.

@sesquipedalophobe said:

I still can't make love to Anya under suppressive fire. I think that factored into the score.

Anya is hot but looks to dudebro under the COG gear, not sure if I like such a manlychick

Fuck reviews pretty much sums up how I feel about them. Giantbombs or not.

As long as a site stays consistent in it's reviews across titles, then it all works out. Comparing scores from different sites is always a losing proposition.

Read this a few days back when someone retweeted his post of the article on twitter.

Like many in this thread, I don't care for Sterling, and yet I still think this a well written article. It's pretty ridiculous that Epic Games tweeted about being shocked after getting an 8/10, and I'm kinda surprised that they didn't bother to read the actual review.

I agree with pretty much everything in that article.

@Galiant said:

How about we just get rid of review scores, so people will actually read reviews, Metacritic can die and hard working people developing games won't get worse pay because some jerk decided to bring down a game's average score by spamming Metacritic?

It's all so incredibly stupid!

While I do think people need to read reviews more instead of just looking at the score and being on their way, I think review scores really do help. If there were no review scores, games I never would have wanted to pick up (Psychonauts) because of one reason or another, I would have completely overlooked. But the fact that it had that critical acclaim, it made me stop and take another look.

I have outgrown the thought of more numbers means we can more accurately rate a game, I really think Giant Bomb has hit it on the head with the 5 point system, where a game with a 5/5 means they really enjoyed it and think you will too, instead of a 10/10 where most people think it is flawless and will change your life.

 Kudos to Sterling and Destructoid for having balls. I'm now a fan, page bookmarked. 
 
P.S. Gears 2 was an 8/10 at best.

Every fucking time, who gives a shit.

Step 1 -> Give great game slightly less than average review.

Step 2 -> Wait for controversy, get massive page views

Step 3 -> Further inflame controversy with article talking about controversy, get massive page views

Step 4 -> Get money, get paid.

I used to think he just wanted attention, but he's been pretty on the money lately.  The 1-10 scale is definitely busted, and people who actually make games talking shit about 8 out of 10s need to step back.

@Afroman269 said:

@Nottle said:

I never understood why a 5 star scale is any better than a 10 point scale. Anyone have a good argument for it?

Easy. 1 star is used for games that tend to be shit. 2 stars is for games with a lot of flaws. 3 stars is the middle of the road and it's not completely awesome or completely terrible. 4 stars is a solid but not perfect game. 5 stars is "yo this is game is badass". It's an easy system and it's better than the silly 10 point scale. Like there's a big difference between an 8.7 and a 8.8 game.

But I guess looking at the numbers isn't what matters, after all Jeff gave Quake 4 a 8.0 Great despite the fact that he thinks the game sucks. How does that work?

@mazik765 said:

@GuyIncognito said:

@Barbed_Haywire said:

Hi all,

Jim Sterling from GameFront just wrote a pretty poignant article about the backlash he got for giving Gears of War 3 a score of 8/10, I find stuff like this absolutely fascinating so I thought I'd share it with everyone and get your thoughts.

http://www.gamefront.com/gears-of-war-3-perfect-review-scores-by-divine-right/

So what do you think? Personally I hate that the 1-10 scale has become a 7-10 scale, and that developers and fanboys think, just by the mere fact of a game being a AAA title, it must be entitled to a certain score.

"Last night, I reviewed Gears of War 3 for Destructoid"

I stopped reading right there.

You got farther than I did. I stopped at the first mention this was associated in anyway with Jim Sterling.

Yeah I thought the same thing, but y'know... he's just sayin "stop complaining about an 8/10", so that's a pretty normal thing to say.

@Nottle: Objectivity. If he didn't like it, but could see why others would like it, then he would feel fine with giving it 8/10. You also have to think of the context of the score in his opinions mind. Is it a bad game, or is it just so much more disappointing than the previous instalments? It's like Pixar movies for example. All of them being rated so highly is great, until you get a movie like Cars 2 which is generally classed as their worst movie. Now, reviewers say it's not a bad movie, it's just not up to scratch with the rest of the bunch.

@Jeffsekai said:

This happens every time, who gives a shit.

@Tebbit said:

I've noticed that non-American publications (and specifically non-American reviewers) have been scoring the game lower than average, largely because they found the narrative elements to be... not perfect. Gamespot UK's Start Select programme makes fun of it, Jim Sterling, Eurogamer and others (which I can't recall off the top of my head) are examples of this.

Has anyone paused to think that this may be a regional thing? Gears has always told a very Western, and especially American story (often overly so, never forget those bro-tastic moments from 1 and 2), so couldn't it be that European, English or otherwise foreign-to-the-US reviewers simply don't find that kind of narrative appealing?

I have never found the characterisations in the other Gears games to be anything special, and the actual storytelling bordered on atrocious at times. Having not played 3 yet (where most reviewers inform me significant strides in character development have been made) I can't say whether this trend has truly continued or not, but the way I see things panning out, I reckon the storytelling just wasn't Jim's cup of tea.

TLDR: different people have different opinions. People who "stop reading" after they see the words Jim Sterling or Destructoid are flippant morons who can't tell the significant difference between justified opinion and parody.

Well this thread's about the internet reacting to the review more than it's about the review-- BUT ANYWAY THAT'S BORING, your point's more interesting;

I'm english and I love Gears, but I can see what you mean. We watch different stuff on TV here, we don't think about our own millitary hardly ever, nobody knows what a gun actually looks like in real life, and we were still a little bit behind on broadband back when games like Unreal or Quake were big hitters. In New York there's people literally sleeping outside shops for this game, but I'm here in Manchester n it was sittin on a regular shelf under some MW3 competition stuff.

It's really hard to tell though, I don't think we'll ever know if there's really a big difference here or not.

EDIT-- I can tell you that any sane English person thinks all the dialogue in this game is fuckin cheesy as hell. That sticks out.

God I love Jim sometimes...

Gears of War 3 isn't a great game so I'm surprised it's doing as well as it is. It's dull with tedious gameplay (cover to cover, shoot things yo) and rather boring, generic characters. Solidly made, just the formula is so boring.

Really games should receive lower scores than they do, as somebody has said reviews are merely 7-10 scales on most sites.

@Sooty said:

Gears of War 3 isn't a great game so I'm surprised it's doing as well as it is.

Well the thing about games is they are subjective. You can't really say that and be surprised that a lot of people feel differently especially since most things being said about it are positive. You might not think it's great but clearly others don't share your opinion of it.

@SethPhotopoulos said:

@Sooty said:

Gears of War 3 isn't a great game so I'm surprised it's doing as well as it is.

Well the thing about games is they are subjective. You can't really say that and be surprised that a lot of people feel differently especially since most things being said about it are positive. You might not think it's great but clearly others don't share your opinion of it.

That is true.

I really tried to like the series again but I got burned out playing the first game and it hasn't changed enough to grip me. I'm surprised so many people are still such fans of the gameplay. At least I can say I gave it a shot instead of just ignoring it and basing my opinions on from when I played the second game.

This shit has been going on forever and it's a pretty tired argument by now. Reviewers can give whatever score they want, fanboys can get outraged, a week passes and everyone forgets, then the cycle continues.

However it's impossible to take Jim Sterling seriously regarding this matter. He has a history of trolling, unprofessional reviews and really childish, petty behavior towards anyone that disagrees with him that it pretty much makes him irrelevant as a reliable reviewer in my book. It's like the boy who cried wolf - if you're shtick is giving off the wall review scores that serve the purpose of generating page views over genuine buyers advice, you don't get to be upset about it when you think you're in the right.